Unseen 2015: Introducing 2015 Campaign by Peter Puklus

by UnseenJune 01 2015

Unseen is proud to present the first image of the Unseen 2015 campaign, created by emerging Hungarian artist Peter Puklus (b. 1980, Romania). The campaign is the result of an exciting collaboration between the award-winning, Budapest-based artist and Unseen, a fair and festival embracing new photography.

Over the past years, Unseen has established a tradition of inviting talented artists to create the annual Unseen campaign images. Following previous Unseen campaign artists Blommers & Schumm, Viviane Sassen, and Lorenzo Vitturi, this year Unseen invited Peter Puklus to create the 2015 campaign images. The 2015 Unseen campaign visualises various interpretations of a sculpted self- portrait of Peter Puklus. In creating the sculpture, Puklus reinterpreted the only remaining photograph of a sculpture by Hungarian avant-garde artist Joseph Csaky (Head, 1913), which was either lost or destroyed. The artist photographed the resulting sculpture in various contexts, superimposing different colour-palettes onto the scene. The resulting photographs – several of which will be available for purchase in limited editions at Unseen 2015 – explore the visual conventions of self-portraiture and territories of photography beyond the frame.

Peter Puklus explains: “The campaign came at a perfect time, allowing me to reflect deeper on the story of this sculpture, which runs parallel to the ‘unseen’ idea. Made from the very temporary material of plaster, it disappeared after a year. It no longer exists; all that remains is one photograph. Nobody knows what the side or the back of this sculpture looked like. Bringing alive new perspectives of it has become part of my process.”